


In the beginning

by Overturned_Decent



Series: Love/Hate, but mostly Aspen [2]
Category: Dear Evan Hansen - Pasek & Paul/Levenson
Genre: F/F, M/M, You don't need to read Love/Hate first to understand this, also evan and connor aren't dating Yet, but id suggest starting here when it comes to the one shots i plan on writing after this, so we're meeting all the characters and and seeing how it starts out, this story acts as an introduction to the Love/hate universe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-04
Updated: 2018-01-04
Packaged: 2019-02-28 10:48:35
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,196
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13269867
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Overturned_Decent/pseuds/Overturned_Decent
Summary: At one time, it was just Evan, his roommate, Jared, and the canary that Jared never took care of.But one trip to the pet store to get bird food may change all of that.





	In the beginning

**Author's Note:**

> hey hey I'm writing more parts for this au since people seemed to enjoy it

Evan didn’t really know what he was doing here. All he was supposed to get was bird food for his roommate, Jared’s, canary. But. He already had the bird food, it was held against his chest, full and ready to be paid for. Yet, he wasn’t walking to the front of the store to pay. He was just standing there. Staring. At the cats. 

 

_ This is stupid, what do I think I’m even doing? I can’t get a cat _ .

 

But he  _ wanted _ a cat. He’d always wanted a cat, ever since he was a kid. Too bad the place he had lived didn’t allow pets. 

 

But this apartment did. Jared had a bird, Evan knew the eighteen something year old who had just moved in had a dog, and there was an older lady on the first floor who had cats. It was possible he could get a cat. 

 

But they probably don’t have money to afford it. He hadn’t asked Jared yet, and he couldn’t just spring this on him. It was no secret that Jared had been forced to live with Evan; they both went to the same college and they had been family friends as children and teens. 

 

It was a stupid idea, the twenty two year old decided, just about ready to turn away and pay for the bird food, but then. Something meowed. 

 

“Oh jeez,” he murmured audibly, forgetting about the rest of the store to immediately kneel and stare through the glass into the decently sized enclosure that held the cats’ cages as well as some toys and scratching posts. 

 

Staring back at him, with most innocent gleaming gold eyes he had ever seen, was a kitten. Like, a literal baby cat. 

 

“Oh, jeez,” He whispered again, tapping his finger against the glass gently, the kitten following his finger with apt attention. “Hi there! Aren’t you just the cutest..” he whispered in a sweet voice. 

 

The cat had a white chest and front limbs, as well as over its muzzle adn in a small stripe up its nose. A ginger/cold color fell over its back, fluffy tail,  and parts of its face. 

 

“You like what you see?” Evan glanced up to find an employee staring down at him. “This is Ryan, we just got her last week. About three and a half months old, I believe.”

 

He nodded carefully. “She-she’s adorable,” he paused. “Is she up for adoption?”

 

The employee, whose name tag read “Zoe”, visibly lit up. “She is! Here, come with me, I’ll show you her papers.” He nodded, a feeling of excitement building up in his chest. They stopped at a place next to the cat center, where there was a semi-large filing cabinet. Zoe opened up a box marked “CATS” and sifted through it, before pulling out a file with a soft “here we go”. 

 

She stood next to Evan, opening it up. 

 

“Alright, so, Ryan’s about three months, hey I was right, she was found in a warehouse parking lot with her mother and two brothers.”

 

“She has siblings? I don’t want to separate them.”

 

She frowned sadly. “Both boys were already adopted together, Ryan’s the last one.”

 

“What about the mom?”

 

Zoe’s frown deepened. “She was sick when we found them. Not contagious, can’t be passed by DNA, but bad enough that she passed away not too long after.”

 

“That’s horrible,” he whispered. 

 

“Yeah,” she nodded, before continuing reading the file. “Ryan’s super well behaved, and usually very friendly and affectionate. She does get territorial about certain things and people, like, there’s a feathered toy in there that she goes nuts over, its hilarious.” Evan smiled. 

 

“Um, her mother was a Kurilian Bobtail, but her tail is obviously super long and fluffy, so we assume the dad must’ve been something else.”

 

“Okay,”

 

“Now, are you seriously considering adopting her?” He thought back to Jared crying once over a cat that stuck its head in a tissue box, and how Evan hadn’t been informed that there was going to be a full time canary in the living room, how they both had jobs….

 

“Can I text my roomate?”

 

“Sure!” She nodded, smiling. 

 

He fished out his phone, finding a text from Jared.

 

From J-Red (evan did not consent to this contact name)

12:58 a.m/ dude, tweetys dyin over here, whats taking you so long?

 

To  J-Red (evan did not consent to this contact name)

1:08 p.m/ im buying a cat

 

He put it back in his pocket. “Okay, he’s cool with it.”

 

“Great!” Zoe replied eagerly. “Have you ever owned a pet or a cat before?”

 

“My roommate has a bird, and he forces me to take care of it sometimes…?” he offered. 

 

“Okay, so you’re pretty inexperienced. That’s fine! I’ll write you up a list of things you’ll probably need. While I do that, I’m gonna let you in there so you can play with Ryan.”

 

“Okay,” Zoe led him back over to the cats, taking a key that was attached to her lanard, and unlocked the door, quickly ushering him in. He stood there a moment, before wandering to where he spotted Ryan. 

 

“Hi, kitty.” He said gently, crouching down in front of her. Her ears perked up, and she immediately butted her face into his leg. “Aw, hey there,” He scratched her on her cheek, earning a loud purr from her. Ryan walked a small circle around him, rubbing her face against his leg, purring. Suddenly, a wet sounding hiss came from the tiny cat. A slightly larger gray/brown tabby cat had padded over to investigate, and was currently being scared off by the ginger and white baby, who was fluffing up her fur and hissing. 

 

“Hey, it’s okay,” He whispered, carefully putting his hands around the cat and lifting her into his lap, stroking her head to try and calm her down. “You really are territorial, huh?” He asked and she gazed up at him innocently, as if she hadn’t just been ready to attack the larger cat. “Aren’t you a little charmer?” He laughed as she stretched out, laying across his lap. 

 

A few minutes later, the door opened, revealing Zoe. She held a few pieces of paper in her hand. “Hey, I got your stuff. Why don’t you pick up some of the stuff on the list while I get her ready to go.”

 

“Okay, thanks.” He carefully set the kitten on the floor, getting to his feet and taking the papers. It looked like a list of cat care items. Zoe opened the door for him, dn he picked up his bird food, wandering around in search of a shopping cart. He snatched one from an area of discarded carts, dropping the bird food in and going  off to the cat section of the store insearch of cat litter. Anxiously checking his phone for some kind of answer from Jared, Evan felt an instant wash of relief upon seeing the simple text of “k, hope it's cute” and that was all. See? He had nothing to worry about. 

 

Some twenty or some odd minutes later, he was pushing a decently full cart out to the parking lot where his cart was, Zoe walking alongside him holding one of the free, very cheaply made cat carriers, which held Ryan safely inside. He unlocked the car, loading the items in the trunk while Zoe set the cat carrier in the passenger seat, strapping the seatbelt around it. 

 

“I’ll get your cart for you,” She said, taking it by the handles. “Take care of that kitty!”

 

“I will, thanks for your help!” She smiled and waved, skipping back to the Petsmart. He sat down, buckling the seatbelt and pulling out of the parking lot. 

 

When he arrived back at apartment 22B, he found Jared was gone, most likely already having left for work. On the list of cat instructions, Zoe had suggested Evan not release her into the entire, massive, two bedroom apartment he had (that's sarcasm), instead just starting with an enclosed space. He carried her inside first, deciding to bring in the rest once she was settled. 

 

Setting the carrier down on the floor beside his bed, he shut the door, unlatching the carrier door. Ryan was scrunched up at the very back, the thin cloth they had put on the floor of it riding up around her. 

 

“Hey there,” he said softly, “I’m gonna leave you here, with the door shut. Trust me, it’s super nice here, you’ll love it. I’m gonna bring all your new things inside, then I’ll come check on you, okay?” She didn’t say anything, which, yeah, he expected. 

 

Evan unloaded the car in two trips, dropped a cup of bird food in the canary cage, then dragged the several bags down the hall to where his room was. He cracked the door open, not noticing the sign of any cats wandering around and pushed it open, dropping the three bags onto the floor. He carefully shut the door again, and began unloading them. He set a small feathered toy on the ground in front of the case, which after a quick peek inside, revealed Ryan was still inside. 

 

He set one of those cat mat things on the floor, then put the two metal dishes hed bought on top of it. Sprinkling a couple treats inside it, he sat down on his bed, snapping a quick picture of the current set up. He posted it to his Instagram account, with the caption “I was only going to the store for bird food..” 

 

“Hey, Ryan, um, no offense, but I feel like your name doesn’t suit you all that well.” he told the kitten, who was still hidden inside the carrier. “I was thinking about a new name for you, and I think that I’m gonna call you…” He paused, “Pine? Or, no, that’s stupid. I want to give you a nature name though. Maybe Dandelion?” She did nothing. 

 

“Yeah, that’s what I thought, uh,” His gaze wandered around before landing on the tree cataloguing poster he had hung up over his closet. “Oh, perfect.” He got up, standing in front of it, scanning it for something that stuck out. 

 

“Uh.. oh. Oh my gosh, oh, I got it!” He turned to the carrier, crouching down to look at her. “Aspen. It’s perfect, oh gosh, it’s perfect. Do you like your new name, Aspen?” She did seem to perk up slightly. “C’mere, the instructions said that if you didn’t come out right away, I should try to prompt you out.” He reached a hand in hesitantly, his fingertips brushing against her soft fur. After a few moments, he felt the cloth move, and then she poked her head out cautiously. 

 

“Hey there,” His voice was as quiet as it could possible be. “Hye, Aspen, come here.” She padded over to him, whiskers twitching and eyes scanning her new surroundings. Aspen butted her head against his knee. “There we go. You’re okay.” He scratched her cheek, and she began purring. 

 

~~

The meeting with Jared went smoothly. He, as expected, nearly cried when Aspen started purring, claiming that she was his and Evan was a monster if her tried to seperate them. Of course, as soon as Evan went to his room, she eagerly followed, completely abandoning Jared. 

 

Evan had to go to work the next day, which meant leaving Jared alone with Tweety Bird as well as Aspen, which worried Evan to no end. However, whenever he would come back, Aspen would attach to him like a leach, which made Evan’s mood a thousand times better.

 

About a week or so later, he and Jared made plans to meet during Jared’s lunch break at some downtown hipster joint that Evan had been to once and vowed to never return because of how overcrowded it was. That didn’t last long. Whatever. As he entered the dim place filled with cushioned, plush couches and seats, nearly all taken by people around his age, he spotted Jared at a couch near the back. He sat down, noticing the plate filled with far too many pastries. 

 

“You didn’t wait for me to order?”

 

Jared scoffed. “Of course not, I’m hungry.”

 

Evan rolled his eyes. “Fine, save my seat.”

 

“What do you think I’ve been doing?” He called after Evan, while the blond ignored him. 

 

He scanned the menu while he waited in line, deciding on a hot chocolate and some sort of raspberry filled tart. Once reaching the front of the line, a vaguely familiar voice shouted, “one moment”. As she turned to take his order, he recognized her. 

 

“Zoe?”

 

“How do you know my- wait, you’re the one who adopted Ryan!” She grinned. “It’s Evan right? How’s the fluffy babe doing?”

 

“Yeah, um, it’s Evan. And she’s really good, my roommates kind of in love with her, he nearly cries whenever she looks at him.” Zoe laughed. “Oh, and she’s Aspen now, actually.”

 

She nodded. “Aspen, I like it!”

 

“So, what are you doing here? I thought you worked at the Petsmart?”

 

“Oh, I did. But I quit. I have a lot of trouble staying with one job for too long, so now I’m here.”

 

“Oh, that’s cool.”

 

“Let me get your order, I don’t want any customers getting pissed at me for taking too long.”

 

“Okay, um, I’ll have the medium hot chocolate and the raspberry tart.”

 

“Nice, oh, I’ll out my number on it so we can text sometime!” 

 

“Uh, okay, that-that sounds good.”

 

“Cool! I’ll call you when it’s ready!” 

 

“Okay,”

 

AS he sat back down, Jared immeidentally rounded on him. 

 

“Dude, why were you talking to that barista for so long? Was she hitting on you?”

 

“Um, no, I don’t- I don’t think she was. She just- she’s the one who helped me adopt Aspen, so we talked about her, and then she said she’d give me her number, so,”

 

“Dude, I think she’s hitting on you.”

 

“I- really?”

 

He shrugged. “Sure. Anyway, you’ll never believe this asshole I had to deal with at K-Mart…”

 

~~~

Turns out, Jared was incredibly wrong. Zoe texted him later that day and they exchanged Instagram handles, and after following her, Evan came across loads of selfies of her and another girl who he quickly realized was her girlfriend. But after some time, they became fast friends. They often hung out at either Evan and Jared’s place, where she met Jared and decided she would begin teasing him a cruel amount, ad where they played with Aspen; or Evan would go to wherever she worked at the moment and distract her. The latter was where he met her girlfriend, Alana, who was probably the smartest person he’d ever met. It wasn’t long before Zoe took initiative and made a group chat for the four of them.

 

It was about two months since he’d adopted Aspen, when he met Zoe’s brother. Now. Evan was not going to try and argue that he hadn’t been completely speechless when she introduced them. It had gone something like this:

 

“I’ve mentioned I live with my brother, right?” Zoe told him as she let him into her apartment. 

 

“Yeah, I think.”

 

“Well, he’s here right now and I want you guys to meet.”

 

“I’m not, uh, great at meeting new people, Zoe..” She waved him off. 

 

“That’s stupid. You were totally fine when you met me.”

 

“Yeah, cause I was distracted by the baby kitten staring at me  _ and _ you were super nice and friendly.”

 

“Well, thank you, but I’m sure you’ll do great, okay?”

 

He nodded somewhat hesitant, “Okay,”

 

“Great!” She replied cheerfully, then dropped her hands on her hips and screamed, “ _ CONNOR, MY FRIEND, EVAN, IS HERE.” _ Then, turning back to Evan, “He’ll be out soon, he’s probably in his room drawing or something.” Evan nodded. 

 

“Hey, you want something to eat? I stole shit ton of pastries and crap from my parents house when I went to see them yesterday.”

 

“What do you have?”

 

“Uh, cookies, bread, muffins-”

 

“Wait. What kind of muffins?”

 

“Chocolate chip raspberry?”

 

“Holy fuck, I’d literally kill Jared for one of those.”

 

“Did I show up at a hitman meeting?” Evan whirled around to see- oh. Um. Yeah. That must be….Zoe’s brother...okay. He was. He was hot. He was really hot. And the part of Evan that was attracted to boys was currently on 100%.

 

“No,” Zoe replied. “Evan was just threatening his roommate to get a chocolate chip raspberry muffin.”

 

“Wait, no, what the fuck, those are mine,” He practically sprinted into the kitchen to snatch the muffins out of Zoe’s hands.

 

“Connor,” She hissed, hitting him with a box of cereal. “He just threatened to murder his roommate and swore for the first time since I met him, I’m afraid if i don’t give him the muffins I’ll unleash the apocalypse.” Connor looked at Zoe, then at Evan, then at the muffins, before sighing and pushing them across the counter to Evan, who instantly snatched them up.

 

“There, see, I can be nice.”

 

“Good job.” Zoe smirked. “See, Evan, I told you you’d make a good first impression. Plus,” She bit off a piece of what looked like a snickerdoodle cookie. “You two have loads in common. Favorite muffin flavor, the willingness to murder people for food, and me as your friend.”

 

“Not anymore,” Connor announced. “No human who offers up my muffins is a friend of mine.”

 

“They were  _ my _ muffins!” She demanded, smacking him with the cereal box again. “All you did was act as a distraction,” then to Evan, “A distraction  _ I _ came up with, for the record.”

 

“Okay, but who had to tell Mom and Dad that they were considering getting a job at a rubber band making factory? Not you. I think that makes them mine.”

 

Evan roughly swallowed the piece of muffin in his mouth. “A rubber band making factory? Zoe, that’s the  _ best _ distraction you could come up with?”

 

“That’s what I thought!” Connor agreed. “Like, Zoe’s the one with a new job every five minutes, it would make more since for her to be the one to claim she’d start working there.”

 

“Exactly.” Evan nodded, stuffing more muffin in his mouth. 

 

“I can’t believe you guys are ganging up on me.” Her face suddenly lit up. “Wait. Ganging up.  _ Gay _ -nging up. Oh my God, I’m a genius.”

 

Evan audibly sighed, and Connor started to leave the room. 

 

“Wait- Connor, don’t leave,  _ please _ .” She wailed dramatically.

 

“That was so bad, Zoe. Like, that was terrible.” He told her as he sat down at the barstool next to Evan. 

 

“Why are you booing me? I’m right.”

 

“Get out of my house.” 

 

“I pay the bills too!” Evan buried his face in his hands in an attempt to hold in the laughter. 

 

By the time he was in his car driving home, he had eaten seven muffins, seen Zoe throw four different things at Connor and two pillows at him, and he’d nearly started crying after being shown pictures of Zoe in fourth grade. 

 

And he had Connor’s phone number too. 

**Author's Note:**

> if you noticed Aspens species and descriptions were different, you'd be right. i changed it in Love/Hate, so this is the newer, more accurate version. thanks for your time, leave a comment if you liked it!!


End file.
